45 deaths have been been confirmed from dengue virus throughout KP
PESHAWAR: Medical experts have rubbished Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) accusations against Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Arbab Khizer Hayat of purposefully providing favorable environment for growth of dengue mosquito’s larvae at his residency.
PTI’s official twitter account on Saturday posted a news clipping from a local newspaper claiming that the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Health Department team found dengue larvae from PML-N leader Arbab Khizer Hayat’s house. News clipping stated that the larvae was found from the air cooler placed in his house.
پشاور میں ن لیگ کی جانب سے ڈینگی پر شرمناک سیاست، محکمہ صحت کی ٹیم نے لیگی رہنما کے گھر سے ڈینگی لاروا برآمد کر لیے۔ pic.twitter.com/hAwi1tI0v6
— PTI (@PTIofficial) October 7, 2017
However, medical experts labelled these accusations as unreasonable and baseless.
Member of Dengue Expert Advisory Group Punjab, Dr. Muhammad Zaman Khan argued that a typical dengue mosquito’s lifetime flight radius is less than 200 meters. “Therefore, if a dengue mosquito is found somewhere, it can only infect the locality within the 200 m range, it can’t be responsible for dengue outbreak all over KP,” he reasoned.
Dr. Khan who is also the focal person for dengue at Jinnah Hospital, Lahore further said that such political statements were made in 2012 as well. “It is a clear incompetency of the provincial health department of KP, as it was the case in Punjab in 2012,” he asserted.
Dr. Khan has trained doctors at Swat when dengue outbreak affected the city in 2013. He argued that the actual reasons behind dengue’s sudden outbreak in KP is because of the uncovered water reserves and lack of regulation by the provincial authorities.
Dr. Soma Saeed, who is a medical officer at Jinnah hospital, Lahore also dismissed these claims by arguing that if larvae of dengue mosquito is found at a certain place, it doesn’t ascertain purposeful growth of its specie. “Since Dengue virus is already prevalent in KP, there is a possibility for it to be found anywhere,” she said.
According to the official report of KP Health Department as reported by Pakistan Today on Friday, around 60,000 suspected dengue cases were reported in 13 districts of KP. The report said that 12,632 patients tested positive for dengue virus from among 60,665 patients screened from a total of 60,807 reported cases.
The department has confirmed 45 deaths from the mosquito-borne viral disease throughout the province, while around 400 patients were under treatment in different hospitals.